Miles Franklin 2013 longlist announced

26 March 2013 Books+Publishing

The longlist for this year’s Miles Franklin Literary Award has been announced.

The longlisted titles are:

Floundering (Romy Ash, Text)
Lola Bensky (Lily Brett, Hamish Hamilton)
Street to Street (Brian Castro, Giramondo)
Questions of Travel (Michelle de Kretser, A&U)
The Beloved (Annah Faulkner, Picador)
The Daughers of Mars (Thomas Keneally, Vintage)
The Mountain (Drusilla Modjeska, Vintage)
The Light between Oceans (M L Stedman, Vintage)
Mateship with Birds (Carrie Tiffany, Picador)
Red Dirt Talking (Jacqueline Wright, Fremantle Press).

The shortlist will be announced on 30 April at the State Library of New South Wales. The winner will be announced on 19 June at the National Library of Australia in Canberra.

In contrast to previous years, this year’s longlist is dominated by female authors, with eight of the 10 longlisted books written by women writers. According to the Trust Company, which administers the award, the judges received 73 entries, half of which were written by women.

The longlist also includes five debut novels and four authors who have previously been shortlisted for a Miles Franklin Literary Award. Thomas Keneally, who has been longlisted for The Daughters of Mars, won the award in 1967 for Bring Larks and Heroes (Text Classics) and in 1968 for Three Cheers for the Paraclete (Vintage).

As previously reported by Books+Publishing, this year’s award is worth $60,000, up from $50,000 last year. Last year’s award was presented to Anna Funder for All That I Am (Penguin).

The Trust Company has also recently launched the Miles of Reading Challenge to encourage Australians to read the longlisted books. Members of the public are invited to submit their own reviews of the longlisted books on the award website for the chance to win copies of the books. For more information, visit the website here.

Category: Local news